Abyss Domination

Chapter 88

Soran stayed awake almost the whole night. He was trying his utmost to analyze Invisibility and construct the spell model in his mind. It may have been the hardest Level 2 spell to learn, but it was also the most useful one. It be cast not only on the caster, but also on others, making it very versatile.

“Invisibility (Level 2 Spell): After casting Invisibility, the target will visually disappear. Creatures with the innate ability to see through Invisibility and those who have cast See Invisibility will still be able to see the target. Invisibility can visually hide the target, but will not erase any noise or physical evidence made by the them. When the spell is active, whenever the target picks up or holds an object, the item will be concealed as well. The item will be visible again once it is released. Invisibility will last until it expires, or until the target launches an attack. Invisibility has a duration of ten minutes for every spellcasting score point the caster has, and its effects can be made permanent with Permanency.”

Soran was now a Level 5 wizard, and with his 20 Intelligence, his spellcasting score was 10. Invisibility cast by Soran would last for a hundred minutes. It was definitely not a short period of time, and it could be extremely useful when cast at the right moment, especially for escaping. Furthermore, during the trip to Autumnfall, they might encounter dangerous monsters or large hordes of monsters. If that happened, he could cast Invisibility on Vivian and let her hide while he handled the situation. There were pretty much no monsters in the wilderness that could see through Invisibility, thus it would be a lot safer if he could learn it before they left Whiterun.

Rogues often used invisibility potions and invisibility scrolls to bring out the full potential of Sneak, Backstab, and Steal. Be it assassinating or stealing from the rich, these items were very useful. Back in the game, the only reason Soran managed to get out of the slums and became an adventurer was because he managed to get his hands on a bottle of invisibility potion.

An invisibility potion lasted for one hour and cost 200 Gold Derahls. As these potions were pretty rare, most rogues would only use them when assassinating important targets or stealing in the noble district. One hour was enough for them to steal plenty of things, and if they were lucky, they could earn as much as a thousand Gold Derahls in just one theft. However, they would mostly raid low- or mid-ranked nobles because there were a lot of alarms and security measures in high-ranked nobles' houses. Back in the game, a thief once managed to steal an antique vase worth 50,000 Gold Derahls, making him wanted within the entire Southern Principality for a long time.

Soran did not mind stealing; in fact, he’d done a lot of it. If it was necessary, he would unhesitatingly steal from the nobles. This was another reason he was trying so hard to learn Invisibility. After studying it for a few days, he had already analyzed sixty percent of the spell. He’d raised his Literacy to 115, and together with his high Intelligence, it sped up the learning process a lot. If his estimations were right, it would take roughly two more days to learn the spell. Soran could then fill his two Level 2 spell slots with Invisibility, granting him over three hours of invisibility, which was enough to do a lot of things.

Soran now had six Level 0 spell slots, four Level 1 spell slots, including the bonus one from his Ring of Wizardry, two Level 2 spell slots, and one Level 3 spell slot, for a total of thirteen.

Low-grade wizards had limited spell slots. Due to the limitations of the Magic Network, most wizards could only hold relatively few spells. Intelligence currently affected one's spell strength, cast speed, time needed to reconstruct spells, and highest level spell usable. The Magic Network controlled the number of spell slots a wizard held though. Only after the fall of the Magic Network could exceptional wizards show their true talents. Without being limited by the Magic Network, they could cast a lot more spells, and the spells would be a lot more powerful than they used to be. This was because the Magic Network took half of the spells' magic power. Most of it was used to maintain the network, while the rest was absorbed by the Goddess of Magic to strengthen herself.

As long as the Magic Network existed, the Goddess of Magic could assign spell slots as she wished. If she granted more power to the users, the number of spells they could cast would increase, and the same went for the opposite. This was why, when the Time of Troubles started, the Goddess of Magic was attacked by many parties, including Legendary wizards; their aim was to bring down the Magic Network and release the limiter forcefully placed upon them. The price was huge, though, and many wizards ended up losing their spellcasting ability altogether.

Of course, no one in this world currently really knew how the Goddess of Magic set up or ran the Magic Network, thus wizards mainly relied on equipment to increase their spell slots.

Soran washed his face, then went somewhere to practice the White Raven Sword Style. As his level increased, his energy and vitality also increased, making a few sleepless nights bearable. His progress on learning the sword style was slow, but that was only natural.

Soran now had over 5000 Slaughter EXP, which was enough to level up either Rogue or Wizard once, but he decided against it for now. He first wanted to see if he could advance into an advanced profession since it would grant a substantial increase in power.

Lurkers would receive a +10 bonus to Sneak and Detect, godly thieves would receive the same bonus for Pick Lock and Snare, while bounty hunters would have a +10 bonus to Search and receive a tracking ability. Advanced professions were professions based on the basic professions, and tended to be particularly proficient in specific aspects. However, it cost 5000 Slaughter EXP just to obtain an advanced profession, provided that the person had met the prerequisites, and leveling up an advanced profession was also very EXP intensive.

At present, the easiest advanced profession for Soran to obtain was Lurker, since the only requirement was having 150 Sneak. However, he wanted to explore more possibilities, such as Shadowdancer or Bounty Hunter, before he made such an important decision. Advancing into the former required evasion abilities, while the latter had prerequisites related to tracking and detection skills. Both of these professions were very strong after entering the Realm of Legends, especially Bounty Hunter. They could place a Soul Mark on their target, then activate a special skill allowing them to appear behind their target, regardless of their location, by traversing through the Plane of Shadows. Their assassination talents were comparable to Legendary assassins.

If Soran had not multiprofessioned in Wizard, he would unhesitatingly pick Lurker as his advanced profession. However, considering he could soon cast Invisibility, and even Greater Invisibility when he continued to level up, the bonus given by Lurker was almost redundant. As such, Soran wanted to increase his burst damage with a more suitable advanced profession. The top three choices right now were Assassin, Shadowdancer, and Bounty Hunter, not in any specific order.

Assassins need to learn alchemy and know how to make poison beforehand. Bounty hunters can track their enemies well, but they're not that strong in open combat after reaching the Realm of Legends. And, well, advancing into Shadowdancer requires a lot of evasion skills, and I'm nowhere near having what I need for that. I can only wait and see which one I can unlock first for now.

After thinking for a while, Soran went to the magic store to buy some items, such as parchment, ink, a quill pen, powdered gems, and some other miscellaneous items. Those were all the kinds of things used by wizards and not by the common populace. He then bought himself some food for dinner and headed back to his room. In just that single stroll, he had spent over a hundred Gold Derahls.

After returning to his room, Soran began scribing spell scrolls by recalling the memorized spell structures. It was one of a wizard’s most crucial abilities; it allowed them to create backup scrolls for when they had expended all their spell slots. The drawback, though, was that it was quite expensive to scribe scrolls.

As he had filled his four Level 1 spell slots all with Arcane Missile, he could attempt to scribe it four times. Generally speaking, the first few attempts were bound to be failures, but they could still raise his Scribe Scroll skill. As the skill rating increased, the chances of success would rise proportionally as well. After reaching a certain skill level, he could try scribing more difficult and higher level spells.

Unsurprisingly, Soran failed his first trial, the materials wasted costing him around 20 Gold Derahls. The failure did give him two points in Scribe Scroll though. He continued to try, only succeeding on the fourth and final attempt. For a hundred or so Gold Derahls, he’d received an Arcane Missile scroll and increased his Scribe Scroll skill by 12. Scribing Level 1 spells could raise his skill to 50, but anything beyond would require him to try scribing Level 2 or above spells.

Two hours had past at this point.

"It seems that my Concentration is still not high enough."

Soran stored the completed scroll away, then tidied up the place before visiting Vivian. He looked at the wasted materials and sighed, then muttered, "Spellcasters really do have it hard don't they. I haven't even started learning alchemy! Looks like I have to go back to stealing again."

As a rogue and former (perhaps not) thief, stealing was something natural for him. After looking at his remaining funds, he decided to go loot a noble's mansion before leaving the city.

Hope you like the chapter! Next chapter will be out as soon as it is ready; please check back regularly for updates, sorry for the inconvenience.